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Pipe Rolls: Devonshire
(1189-1190)The Great Rolls of the Pipe contain returns of income and expenditure from the sheriffs and farmers of the various English sheriffdoms, counties or shires and from honors and bishoprics in the hands of the crown. This is the roll for the 1st year of the reign of king Richard I, that is, accounting for the year from Michaelmas 1189 to Michaelmas 1190. Many of the individual surnames that appear are in the accounts of fines &c. levied by justices.

BOCLAND'. Cost: £4.00.

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Feet of Fines at Westminster: Shropshire Cases
(1198)Pedes Finium - law suits, or pretended suits, putting on record the ownership of land. This transcript of the feet of fines of the '9th' year of the reign of king Richard I (3 September 1197 to 2 September 1198) was published by the Pipe Roll Society in 1898. The form of these proceedings is fairly standard: giving the date, the place of the hearing, and the names of the justices; the names of the plaintiffs (petentes) and defendants (tenentes) and a brief description of the land in question; the outcome of the case is a quitclaim by one party to the other, with a payment of a suitable sum. These cases were heard at Westminster: the original roll misdates the fines in the justices' eyre to the 9th rather than the 10th year of the reign, and this error may also relate to those at Westminster. In the printed copy the dates given in the margin may be 1197 where they should read 1198, or 1198 where they should read 1199, and may also be 1 or more days out.

BOCLAND'. Cost: £4.00.

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Oblata or Fine Rolls
(1200-1216)All the surviving oblata or fine rolls of the reign of king John were edited by Thomas Duffus Hardy and printed by the Commissioners of the Public Records in 1835. These are the oblata rolls of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd years of the reign, and the fine rolls of the 6th, 7th, 9th, 15th, 16th and 17th years. These rolls contain notices of the oblations or fines offered to the Crown to procure grants and confirmations of liberties and franchises of markets, fairs, parks and free warren; for exemption from tolls, pontage, passage and murage; to obtain justice and right; to stop, delay or expedite pleas, trials and judgments; and to remove suits and processes from inferior tribunals into the King's Court. Fines were also extracted for licence to trade, or permission to exercise commerce or industry of any kind, and to have the aid, protection, or goodwill of the King; to mitigate his anger or abate his displeasure; to be exempted from knighthood either for a term or for ever, and from attending the King in his foreign expeditions; they were also demanded for seisin or restitution of ancestral lands or chattels; for allowing delinquents to be replevied or bailed; for acquittal of murder; and for pardon of trespasses and misdemeanours; for the 'year and a day' of the lands and goods of felons and fugitives. Almost all entries have the county in question indicated in the left hand margin.

BOCLAND'. Cost: £4.00.

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Fine Rolls
(1216-1246)The fine rolls of the 1st to 30th years of the reign of king Henry III record part of the government administration in England. These excerpts from the rolls list in transcript applications by plaintiffs for various writs (such as 'ad terminum' and 'pone') and for assizes to be held by the justices in eyre to look into their grievances. A fine of half a mark (6s 8d) or a mark (13s 4d) was usually levied; the cases are normally identified by county, and record that the appropriate sheriff had been notified. There are also more extensive records, in which more detail is given. The excerpts were made by the Record Commission and printed in 1835.